Effect of composting on dissolved organic matter in animal manure and its binding with Cu

The agricultural application of raw animal manure introduces large amounts of dissolved organic matter (DOM) into soil and would increase transport of heavy metals such as Cu which are widely present in animal manure. The purpose of this research was to evaluate the evolution of DOM from pig and cattle manures during composting through excitation-emission matrix (EEM) fluorescence spectroscopy and the binding ability of DOM toward copper (Cu) ions with the aid of fluorescence quenching titration. The excitation-emission matrix spectra indicated that tyrosine-like, tryptophan-like, and soluble microbial byproduct-like fluorescence decreased significantly, while humic-like and fulvic-like fluorescence increased and became the main peaks in composted manure DOM. Fluorescence quenching titration showed that the complexing capacities of pig and cattle manure DOM decreased after composting. Correlation analysis confirmed that complexing capacity of DOM positively and significantly correlates with tyrosine-like and soluble microbial byproduct-like materials which mostly degraded after composting. These results would suggest that the ability of manure DOM to complex with Cu is inhibited as a result of reduced protein-like materials after composting.